Weekly Highlights: May 2018

Week of May 7th

Field Campaigns

Morton. G-LiHT campaign to assess forest damages from Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico: Doug Morton (618), Bruce Cook (618), Larry Corp (618/SSAI), Ian Paynter (618/USRA), Matt Radcliff (130/USRA), and Samson Reiny (610/SGT) were in Puerto Rico from April 17-May 2 collecting airborne and field data across the island. The team collected high-resolution data from Goddard's Lidar, Hyperspectral, and Thermal (G-LiHT) Airborne Imager for the same flight lines with data acquisitions from March 2017. Data from before and after Hurricane Maria provide 3D estimates of changes in forest structure, terrain elevation from landslides and erosion, and infrastructure, including damages to homes and other structures. The 2018 G-LiHT campaign was funded by the USFWS, USDA, and NASA, and G-LiHT data will be used to support science investigations of hurricane damage and recovery for a diversity of forest types and to support FEMA and Puerto Rican efforts to prioritize efforts for resource management and restoration of critical wildlife habitat. Field data collections will evaluate changes in forest structure and composition from cloud forests on top of El Yunque National Forest to dry forests and mangroves on the east coast. The campaign was coordinated with partner agencies and scientists in Puerto Rico, including the USFS International Institute of Tropical Forestry, University of Puerto Rico, Department of Natural and Environmental Resources, and colleagues from Columbia University with long-term forest inventory studies on the island. Data from the campaign will be shared using the G-LiHT Data Portal and a map interface for the 4 cm resolution stereo air photos: https://glihtdata.gsfc.nasa.gov/puertorico/index.html.This map shows G- LiHT flight lines in purple totaling 3,023 km, with more than 12 billion laser shots across 81,430 ha.

Presentations

Thome. Kurt Thome (618) and Jaime Nickeson (618/SSAI) attended the CEOS Joint Plenary of the Working Group on Calibration and Validation (WGCV) and Working Group on Information Systems and Services (WGISS) held April 9-13 at INPE in San Jose dos Campos, Brazil. The first day and a half were combined WGISS and WGCV meetings, with a focus the first day on Data Formats and Interoperability, CEOS Sites and Data Cubes, and Quality Indicators. The first half of day two was focused on Future Data Architecture (FDA) platforms and elements. The rest of the week, WGCV and WGISS held independent meetings, with Thome leading WGCV as Chair and Nickeson serving as Secretariat. WGCV discussions centered around the uncertainties and definitions with the plethora of FDA and Analysis Ready Data (ARD) efforts being led, while the rest of the meeting centered on Agency and Subgroup reporting.Committe on Earth Observation Satellites: Working Group on Calibration and Validation